Inflatable cushion



June 6, 1961 R. KLEPPER 2,987,114

INFLATABLE CUSHION Filed Aug. 15, 1958 2 Sheets-Sheet 1 /y/ am June 6, 1961 R, KLEPPER 2,987,114

INFLATABLE CUSHION Filed Aug. l5, 1958 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 United States Patent 2,987,114 INFLATABLE CUSHION Raphael Klepper, 1322 San Amaro Road, Jacksonville, Fla.

Filed Aug. 15, 1958, Ser. No. 755,241

4 Claims. (Cl. 155-178) A 'Ihis invention relates to an air cushion and more particularly to a life preserver usable as a detachable cushion seat or back rest for small boats or the like.

Cushions which may be detached from boats so as to be used as life preservers have been known heretofore. Such cushions have usually been of the type having a buoyant ber hlling material, as opposed as to the type which is air lled, for the reason that the former are less subject to losing their buoyant powers in the event they are ripped or otherwise damaged. Such detachable cushions usually have handles which are sewed to or otherwise secured to the cushion proper for purposes of easy and quick removal in the event of an emergency. Furthermore, the attaching elements which hold the cushion in its attached position are usually secured directly to the cushion. Regions in the cushion adjacent to the handle attachments and adjacent to the attaching elements are subject to considerable stress and strain which frequently damages the cushion. Consequently, if the cushion is of the air filled variety one must use extra heavy materials of construction in these regions and take precautions so that no damage will result during normal use of the cushion, and especially during the detachment of the cushion from the seat under emergency conditions. Ideally a detachable cushion usable as a life preserver should have handles and attaching elements which serve their necessary function without putting a stress and strain on the buoyant portion of the cushion itself.

The invention described herein is directed to an air lled life preserver seat cushion that is relatively inexpensive to manufacture and which is characterized by handles and seat attaching elements so formed as to permit relatively no strain upon the cushion itself during the detachment of the cushion from a seat. The cushion has attaching elements so positioned with respect to the front of the cushion that one sitting thereon or reclining thereagainst is unaware of their existence through contact therewith.

Itis an object of the invention to provide an air cushion that is readily detached from a boat seat to serve as a life preserver.

Another object is to provide an air cushion which, as a result of damage thereto is less likely to fail as a life preserver.

It is an additional object to provide a seat cushion life preserver formed from two sheets of resilient heat-sealable thermoplastic sheet material, which cushion includes snap fastener elements for ixing the cushion to a boat seat or the like, and provided with handles so connected with the fastener elements that upon the pulling away of the cushion from the seat relatively no strain is placed upon the plastic, and so arranged that the cushion can be otherwise manipulated by the handles without danger of tearing the air chambers or opening the forming seams thereof.

Patented June 6, 1961 FIGURE 2 is a plan view of the back of the cushion showing the relationship of the snap fastener elements and rope with respect to the air chambers;

FIGURE 3 is a sectional view taken along the lines 3-3 of FIGURE 1; and

'FIGURE 4 is a sectional view taken along the lines 4-4 of FIGURE 1.

The cushion 10 is composed of a front sheet 11 and a back sheet 12 of resilient heat-scalable thermoplastic sheet material. 'Ihe sheets 11 and 12 are heat sealed together along a peripheral flexible joint which includes flexible side joints 1-3 and 15 and flexible end joints 14 and 1.6. The peripheral flexible joint is spaced from the respective edges of the sheets to form a peripheral border composed of side border portions 17 and 18 at the sides of the cushion and end border portions 19 and 20 at the ends thereof.

The peripheral border surrounds a plurality of parallelly spaced elongated chambers including the side chambers 21 and 22 and the inner chambers 23, 24,25 and 2-6.. vAlso within the peripheral border are the smaller transversely placed chambers hereinafter referred to. The border portions are attached to these elongated and transversely placed chambers by means of flexible joints 13, 14, 15 and 16.

The elongated chambers are formed by heat sealing the front and back sheets 11 and 12 `together alonga plurality of parallel flexible joints, namely 27, 28, 29, 30 and 31. These parallel joints serve to space the elongated chambers 21, 2'2, 23, 24,25 and 26 apart from one another.

Along one end of the cushion is a set of two smaller l chambers 32 and 33. These chambers are spaced from the ends of alternate inner chambers 23 and 25 in ,a transverse manner by means of exible heat sealed end joints 34 and 35 respectively. Chamber 32 connects with the elongated chambers 21 and 24 that are adjacent to elongated chamber 23, whereas chamber 33 connects with the elongated chambers. 24 and 26 that are adjacent to elongated chamber 25. Thus, each smaller chamber in the set is positioned transversely to and spaced from an end of an inner elongated chamber by a flexible end joint, and furthermore connected with the elongated chambers adjacent to the inner elongated chamber from which it is laterally spaced.

Along the other end of cushion 10 is a second set of `two smaller chambers 36 and 37. These smaller chambers 36 and 37 are spaced from the ends of alternate inner chambers 24 and 26 in a transverse manner by means of flexible end joints 38 and 39 respectively. Chamber 36 connects with elongated chambers 23 and 25 whereas chamber 37 connects with elongated chambers 25 and 22.

The novel features which are believed to be charac- Thus each of the smaller chambers of the second set are spaced from the end of one of the inner elongated chambers connected by a smaller chamber of the first set.

Inflation valve 40 is disposed at one Vend of chamber 211 and is adapted to supply air to chambers 21, 24 and 26 through interconnecting chambers 32 and 33. Another ination valve 41' is disposed at an opposite end of chamber 22 and is adapted to supply air to chambers 22, 25 and 23 throughinterconnecting chambers 37 and 36. Thus the alternate chambers are separately supplied by air and hermetically sealed from adjacent elongated chambers. By having two sets of chambers hermetically sealed from each other damage to one set permitting the escape of air does not deter the use of the cushion as a life preserver sincethe other set of chambers still render the cushionbuoyant. y l i With particular reference to=Figure 2, itl will be seen that the continuous rope has two sections, each vsection of which overlies the back of the cushion and passes upwardly through a pair of grommets to form handleswith 3 the other section above the respective end border portions. The pair of grommets associated with each section are in alignment with oneV of the parallel ilexible joints which space the elongated chambers so that the attachment element carrying rope section is disposed between elongated chambers on the bottom side of the cushion. Thus, section 42 of the continuous rope overliesr the back of ilexible joint 27 between the elongated chambers 21 and 23. Female4 snap fastener elements 43 and 44 are attached to the rope section 4Z and are adapted to engage corresponding male elements in the seat. The end portions of rope section 42 extend into the front of the cushion through a pair of grommets 46 and 47 which are in alignment with the flexible joint 27 and located in opposite end border portions 19 land 20 respectively. n

Another rope section 48 overlies the back of exible joint -'31` between the elongated chambers 22 and 26. Section 48 is thus located near the opposite side from rope section 42. Female snap fastener elements 49 and 50 are attached to the rope section 48 and are likewise adapted to engage corresponding male fastener elements in the seat. Thecorresponding male snap fastener element 50 is shown in FIGURE l. The end portions of rope section 48 also extend into the front of the cushion through another pair of grommets 51 and 52 which are in alignment with the flexible joint 31 and located in opposite end border portions 19 and 20.

One end portion of section 48 and an adjacent end portion of section 42 meet along the front of end border portion 20 to form rope handle 53 whereas the other end portion of section 48 and the other end portion of rope section 42 meet along the front ofl end border portion 19 to form another rope handle 54.

The snap fastener elements are connected as by sewing to the rope sections and are not otherwise attached to the cushion. It will thus be seen that the buoyant portion of the cushion is only indirectly connected to the rope handles and the snap fastener elements through the grommets. The buoyant portion of the cushion is slideably attached to the rope handles by means of the grommets so'that the force applied for detaching the cushion from the boat seat is transmitted directly from the handles through the intervening'rope to the attaching elements. The rope preferably tits snugly into the grommets so`that the cushion tends to stay in place on the seat or the like. However, the' rope should not t so tightly into the grommets as 'to cause an unnecessary strain to be transmitted to the cushion when the handles are pulled. Another method for retaining the buoyant portion of the cushion in place along the rope sections is to knot the end portions of each section of the rope along the front of the cushion immediately above the grommets associated with each end portion. In this way the buoyant portion of the cushion is -xed to each rope section between the knots yet is slideable therebetween so that no strain is placed upon the cushion whenit is detached from a boat seat by means of the force applied to the handles. It will be apparent that one or more snap fastener elements may be employed in each ropeV section to engage with corresponding fastener elements positioned in the boat seat or the like.

While only a certain preferred embodiment of this invention has been shown and described by way of illustration, many modifications will occur to those skilled in the art and it is, therefore, desired that it be understood that it is intended in the appended claims to cover all such modifications `as fall within the true spirit and scope of this invention.

j What is claimed as new and what itis desired to secure by Letters Patent of the United States is:

l. Aniniiatable cushion comprising a pair of resilient thermoplastic sheets, one superimposed upon the other to form a top and bottom of the cushion, said sheets being attached along a peripheral exible joint spaced from the respective edges thereof to form end and side border portions, said sheets being further attached within saidV border portions along a plurality of parallel joints to form a plurality of elongated parallelly spaced chambers, said chambers being adapted to be inilated, a pair of grommets each passing through an end border portion opposite to the other grommet and being in alignment with one of said parallel flexible joints, said one of said parallel joints being near a side border portion of said cushion, another pair of grommets each passing through an end border portion opposite to the other grommet and being in alignment with another of said parallel flexible joints, said other of said parallelV joints being near the othery side border portion of said cushion, a continuous rope extending downwardly through one grommet of one of said pairs of grommets, under the cushion along the bottom of the iiexible joint aligned therewith, upwardly through the other grommet of said one pair, to and downwardly through a grommet of the other of said pairs of grommets, said-grommet of the other of said pairs of grommets being in the same end border portion as the other grommet of said one pair of grommets, under the cushion along the bottom of the flexible joint in alignment with the'other of said pairs of grommets, upwardly through the other grommet of said other pair in the opposite border portion and thence above said opposite end border portion to complete the continuous rope,- the respective portions of the rope which extend between the grommets in each end border portion constituting handles,- and atleast one fastener element attached to each of the rope sections extending between said pairs of grommets.-

2. An inflatable air cushion comprising two elongated Side chambers and a plurality of adj'acently spaced inner elongated chambers therebetween, said side and inner chambers being parallelly spaced one from another by flexible joints and being adapted to be iniiated, a peripheral border surrounding said chambers and attached thereto by a exible joint, a section of a continuous rope overlying the back of a exible jointV between said elongated chambers near aside thereof, said section having at least one snap fastener element attached thereto, the ends of said section extending into the front of 'the cushion through a pair of grommets aligned with said flexible joint and in opposite end border portions, another section of said continuous ropeoverlying the back of a flexible joint between said elongated chambers near the other side thereof, said section having at least one snap fastener element attached thereto, the ends of said section extending into the front of the cushion through another pair of grommets aligned with said flexible joint and in said opposite end border portion, the respective adjacent ends of said sections meeting to form rope handles overlying the front of the respective saidend border portions.

3. A seat cushion comprising two elongated parallel side chambers, at least one elongated middle chamber spaced between and parallel to said side chambers, a peripheral border having two opposite edges and surrounding said side and middle chambers, a pair of grommets respectively attached to said opposite edges of said border and being in oppositely facing alignment between one of said Side chambers and middle chamber, another pair of grommets respectively attached to said opposite edges of said border and being in oppositely facing alignment between the other of said side chambers and middle chamber, a continuous rope extending through one grommet of said pair of grommets, beneath said cushion between said one -side chamber and middle chamber, through the other grommet of said pair of grommets, to and through one grommetof said other pair of grommets, said one grommet of said other pair of grommets being in the saineV .one of said opposite edges of said border as said other grommet of said pair of grommets, said' rope continuing beneath said cushion between said other side chamber and middle chamber, through the other grommet of said other pair and thence to said one grommet of said pair of grommets to complete said continuous rope, the respective portions of said rope which extend between the grommets in each of said opposite edges of said border constituting handles for said cushion.

4. The cushion as dened in claim 3 further comprising at least one element of a snap fastener attached to each of the rope sections underlying said back of said cushion for detachably mounting said cushion on a seat.

. 6 References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Marshall ..1 Feb, 11, 1930 Williams Nov. 26, 1935 Jenkins Mar. 27, 1951 Rand Oct. 11, 1955 Bishop Jan. 24, 1956 FOREIGN PATENTS France -..v Dec. 12, 1955 

